Νάουσα και Πέλλα

(For some reason this one didn’t post, but I’m trying to upload it now. It was written Friday, just so you know).

Today my Life of Alexander class took a field trip to Naousa, where Aristotle taught Alexander the Great, and to Pella, the capital of ancient Macedonia and the place where Alexander was born. It was about an hour and a half bus ride to Naousa, and Pella was forty minutes away from there. It was interesting in that there’s now another place in Greece I can say that I’ve been, but the trip wasn’t as good as I expected it to be.

In the first place, we had a lecture at Naousa, and the teachers had made it sound beforehand like we were going to have class in the same place Aristotle taught Alexander, as if we would be sitting in the ruins, etc. In reality, we were about 100 meters away from the caves where Alexander and his peers slept, in a building built about 20 years ago, in the basement, in a small lecture room. I couldn’t understand why we drove an hour and a half, and missed other classes, in order to have class in a different room. We could have been back at ACT. Afterwards we checked out the caves, which were cool, but it was just disappointing the way we spent our time.

There were originally buildings in front of the caves where Aristotle taught Alexander, and the boys slept in the caves behind, but there’s no trace of the schoolrooms left. In the centuries after the buildings were gone, the location was apparently used as a place to worship nymphs etc, and I can believe it. It was so green and vibrant, with huge trees, a little babbling brook and flowers starting to bloom around the fields. It was really pretty. The caves were interesting too, especially when you thought about Alexander the Great sleeping there as a boy. They went back pretty far, but we didn’t have much time, or the proper shoes, to explore. The first picture shows the caves from a distance. The second, me embracing my inner nymph. Third, the amazing greenery, and lastly, the entrance to one of the caves. I went sort of far back in one, but I only had my cell phone as a flashlight and had to leave; I was scared a basilisk would pop out and eat me. Or look me in the eye.

Afterwards we went to Pella, the seat of ancient Macedonian power. It wasn’t that great of a visit; I thought we were going to be walking around the ruins; it’s actually an incredibly amazing city, very advanced for it’s time. However, we just went the the museum that houses some of the artifacts recovered. It was neat to see, but small, and quick.

The amount of day that the field trip took up wasn’t worth it compared with the amount of time spent that I actually felt was worthwhile, and I was a little disappointed with the whole trip. It’s at least something I can check off my bucket list…

Tonight we’re going out to a club called eight ball. Apparently some of the kids went before on a Saturday and it was terrible—screaming heavy metal—but Tanya says that it’s completely crazy Friday nights. And by completely crazy, I mean that supposedly people from all walks of life, from the hipster Greeks to the ponytail/mullet Greeks, go out and dance to songs of the 70s and 80s. And Greeks never dance. This should be good.